Updated:The public meeting will be May 24th regarding Nassau Hub for those with long memories of what that date means in team history. Tweet

Political Football 101.

It's time for little hardball.

NYIFC blog entry 7/2010 has Oilers owner playing hardball and now he has a framework for his new arena where taxpayers will contribute without any referendum vote.

At the time I wrote it will go there for Wang sooner or later.

First things first. The New York Islanders should publicly request every Nassau/TOH member of their legislatures (including NIFA) purchase full season tickets for the 2011-12 season and donate the tickets to charity if they cannot attend the games themselves. If there is a draft party they should be in attendance to show their pride for the local team.

The players go above and beyond to make appearances, the teams local politicians should do like-wise wearing New York Islander colors.

It's also long overdue Charles Wang talks about how much he has spent on hockey players (whether they worked out or not) for a team that had a 14m dollar payroll under Howard Milstein. That he was a man with no hockey background in a rich community where a generation of people saw arguably the greatest team in league history and did nothing to purchase it.

That he was the one who brought the alumni back several times and respected the teams past by hiring several former players or retaining many before his tenure.

That he was the one to settle all litigation with Smg, that he was the person who saved another Islander-related franchise that Roy Boe could not pay the bills for and gave this franchise an AHL affiliate after years or sharing.

That he/and or Scott Rechler currently running the Coliseum was no parting gift, handed down from Tom Suozzi, it came with a 17mil price tag on top of millions spent on Lighthouse development.

That he has been the teams most visible owner in New York Islander history, and in the community when previous owners did nothing.

He also has to continue to hammer point he had done several times during Lighthouse discussions, that this is doing something for future generations.

Going back to the politicians, the token lip-service for the hockey team and it's history is included at some point but it's never the headline or close. Time for these politicians to get the message the hockey team comes first after four decades and a billion or two of revenue they have generated for Nassau County.

Simply put from previous entries, it's all been political football and the comments are running as they did a decade ago from politicians/organizations. Too many again see dollar signs for their own interest with the hockey team running a distant fourth or why not wait longer.

There are one or two folks that lost the property MOU to Wang-Rechler bid also back in 2005, who want those doors opened again.

Some would likely want the Coliseum gone so they can get their entire development on that site. Of course TOH/Nassau would never agree to any other private proposal either which they would quickly discover.

Even if Wang agreed to build a new arena out of pocket entirely, there would be politicians or other interests coming out who would demand something out of it without contributing anything.

We also all know the local paper has nothing to gain from a new Nassau Coliseum and conflicts their own vested interest, so you will get a steady diet of bad economic news, some politicians will want more waiting which we have been reading or hearing since the mid-90's.

They are not going to provide the media pep-rallies Edmonton and Pittsburgh did for their agreements.

One thing I can guarantee is it's going to get ugly very fast if a vote is killed before it happens. Charles Wang is going to have to start taking some of those tantrums Daryl Katz did in Edmonton and pointing out what he has done with no help.*******************************You could see this coming from a mile away.

Dick Ebersol was not going to take marching orders from Ed Snider/Comcast-Flyers now that they control NBC.

Ebersol resigned Thursday here and, no it was not only because Snider's Flyers will likely host or participate in five out of the ten outdoors games in next ten years while they have the NBC contract.

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